Friday, April 10, 2015

Why every IVF patient needs to become an expert !

Most patients are not very interested in learning all the ins and outs of IVF. After all , why should you care about the technical minutiae of IVF - you just want to have a baby ! You hated biology in high school - and you can't make sense of all the polysyllabic technical jargon the doctors spout . And does it really matter if you don't understand the different between a follicle and a cyst ? Isn't that the doctor's job ? Why should you break your head trying to make sense of it ?

Most patients are very happy to entrust their care to an IVF specialist , who understands all the bits and bobs of doing IVF . They want him to take charge, so he can do what is right for them. Now this works very well if you are lucky and you have found a good IVF specialist. But what happens if your IVF doctor is not very good ? And how is a patient supposed to differentiate between a good doctor and a bad doctor ? After all, they all look the same, don't they ?

The whole point of becoming an empowered, expert, engaged activated IVF patient doesn't mean that you need to spend time in the laboratory learning how to fertilise your eggs yourself. What it does mean is that you take the time and trouble to understand enough about the IVF process , so that you can judge whether your IVF doctor is going a good job or not. Is his advice sensible ? Does it fit in with accepted medical parctise ? Or is he promising too much ? Is he overtesting ? overtreating ? doing too little ?

Unless you do your homework, you are not going to be able to judge the quality of the doctor's decisions . The truth is that having a baby is so important , that you can't afford to leave everything up to the doctor . You must learn to take an active interest in your treatment.

As we all know, the squeaky wheel gets the grease , and the more well-informed you are, the better the quality of the questions you will be able to ask your doctor. Your doctor will respect you more, and this is the best way of ensuring that the quality of care he will provide you with is high.

Want to learn more about IVF in a painless fashion ? Check out our free IVF e-learning course at www.ivfindia.com.